European shares up, track record‑high U.S. stocks

LONDON (Reuters) - European shares advanced on Monday, with a new record high for a key U.S. index on strong earnings and expectations of the U.S. Federal Reserve continuing its stimulus for longer, boosting investor sentiment.

The Standard & Poor's 500 index rose 0.4 percent on Friday to set a new life-time high following encouraging results from Microsoft and Amazon.com, while on Monday, Australian stocks rose more than 1 percent to a five-year peak and Japan's Nikkei climbed 2.2 percent.

Appetite for riskier assets also rose on expectations the Fed will not start trimming its bond buying programme until the first quarter of 2014 because of recent weak data. Friday's numbers showed orders for U.S. manufactured goods fell in September, while consumer sentiment fell in October.

At 08:06 a.m, the pan-European FTSEurofirst 300 index was up 0.2 percent at 1,287.53 points after rising 0.6 percent last week to register a third straight week of gains. It climbed to a five-year high last week.

Assa Abloy rose 3.6 percent, the top gainer on the FTSEurofirst 300, after the world's biggest lock maker posted a bigger than expected rise in third quarter operating earnings and said it would launch a new restructuring programme before year-end.